Insane Mode

Quote: AZDuffman

The tradeoff, of course, is if you want to drive more than 200 miles then you have to wait hours to fill er up.

If you live in a 2 car household, it wouldn't be too inconvenient for 1 car (electric) to be used for daily driving around town and the 2nd car (gasoline) to be used for the long roadtrips. If you only have 1 car in your household, then buying an electric might not be a good idea.

Quote: AZDuffman

The price tag will not come down.

The Model S will always be a premium luxury car in the $100k range. But Tesla is promising to introduce the Model III for $35k in 2017. Are they bluffing? With $5 billion on the line for their joint venture with Panasonic to build the world's biggest battery factory in Nevada, I don't think they're bluffing. I think they're serious about selling an affordable mass-produced electric to compete with Nissan and GM.

Quote: AZDuffman

Tesla is about selling pollution credits to other automakers.

Currently that's true. But I think their goal is sincere: they believe electric cars are superior to gasoline cars. If their entire business model consisted solely of selling pollution credits they wouldn't have offered to open up their patents to the competition. Tesla knows that eventually the big boys (Ford, Toyota, Honda, etc.) will stop buying the pollution credits and just start selling electric cars, it's only a matter of time. Gas won't stay $2 forever. (In most of Europe and Asia, gas is already taxed beyond $7.)

On the other hand, the big boys haven't done it yet: no else makes a sexy electric car. (There's absolutely nothing sexy about a Nissan Leaf or a Volkswagon eGolf or a Mitsubishi iMiEV or [fill in the blank ugly car].) BMW i8 is the only real competition to Tesla, but if you can't afford a $90k car, there's no point in considering a $135,000 car.

Quote: reno

On the other hand, the big boys haven't done it yet: no else makes a sexy electric car. (There's absolutely nothing sexy about a Nissan Leaf or a Volkswagon eGolf or a Mitsubishi iMiEV or [fill in the blank ugly car].) BMW i8 is the only real competition to Tesla, but if you can't afford a $90k car, there's no point in considering a $135,000 car.

Au contraire, my dear reno. Allow me to give you the Mercedes AMG SLS Black.



It's a bit loud and garish, but what hypercar isn't? "But Face" you may be saying, "I said electric."

I know.

Behold: the battery powered Mercedes AMG SLS Electric Drive.



What, 700hp not enough? It sure blows the petrol powered SLS out of the water. Stomps it in every category - drag, circuit, you name it, despite being half a ton heavier. Looks just as good, too, if you don't mind a car brighter than 1,000 suns. But... it's just not "right".

Here's a vid of it on the Nurburgring. Power, control, it has it all. Quick time, too. But after you get bored watching... shut your eyes. Watch with your ears...



Tires and wind. What a disappointment. All the performance in the world dies without character to carry it, and this one's missing a damn big chunk. It's like dating a 10 that's an intellectual 2. Fun... for about a week. Then all you can think about is what's missing.

Let's try the same thing, but with a whomping V8...



You see? Now that's the ticket. That's sure to leave you nursing a semi for at least an hour, and all the insta-torque in the world can't make up for it. This is your 10 that also knows what coil binding is, and can explain it in detail. This is your total package.

Insane mode? The only thing insane is that people would fall for such a hackneyed gimmick.

Imagine Indy with all electric cars. How exciting.

Yes, but you can hear the string section in the first car (of the violins and cellos if you are playing music)

I don't really care for my car to be a banana color though.

Quote: Evenbob

Imagine Indy with all electric cars. How exciting.

I was at Indy as a child when they ran the first turbo on it. It was kind of like hearing the quietness of an electric by comparison.

Quote: Face

Behold: the battery powered Mercedes AMG SLS Electric Drive.

It's over $430,000. Tesla is a bargain.

Quote: rxwine

Yes, but you can hear the string section in the first car (of the violins and cellos if you are playing music).

Indeed you could. But that second car? Pretty sure one of these comes standard...
http://ts1.mm.bing.net/th?&id=HN.608019657042101820&w=300&h=300&c=0&pid=1.9&rs=0&p=0

I dunno, maybe I'm an extremist. But there really is no comparison. If you've ever raced, even just messing around on a back road or gravel pit, and then tried it in sim, you'll notice a huge difference because you lose a sense. You have no seat-of-the-pants feel, so no matter how realistic the sim, it can never compare.

Sound is exactly the same. I know the Nurburgring. I've watched enough races and drove it in sim enough I could do it blindfolded. Regardless, I have no idea what that electric car is doing. I watch 90 seconds of it and my mind wanders. It's just a car going around a grey ribbon. I'm lost.

That petrol car, though. It's like I'm there, like I can almost feel it. I'm totally rapt to what's going on. Everything he's doing, I can feel it. When he pedals the throttle on the cusp of grip, I know right where his foot is, know just what he's doing. As he powers out, you can hear the revs waver as the tires slip and catch, slip and catch. You can tell when he's merely holding speed through a long sweeper, and know the instant he gives it the beans and is hammer down. You can "feel" the car get light as he goes over the rises, just by the minute change in pitch the motor gives out. You can tell, way before you can see the change in angle, when the rears break free and are no longer holding the car in place. All of this, every bit of this control, is told to you by sound.

If you're hooning like a bogan, sure. Crank up Molly Hatchet's "Flirting With Disaster" and hoon to your heart's content. But if you're racing, you need every bit of sensory perception you can get, and sound is one of the most important.

I would bet cash money that I don't have, that if you gave a man an electric car to set a lap time, then had him do it again with one of those programs that creates engine noise based on actual engine rpm, he would shave several full seconds off a lap time. It's that important. And style, character? Glass packs and fart pipes are everywhere for a reason. And that reason is BRAAAAAPAPAPAPAPAP!!!

Quote: reno

It's over $430,000. Tesla is a bargain.

Yeah, but... tax breaks and such. And you can't put a price on saving the Arctic fox.

It is your philanthropic duty to purchase this car. Go forth, and hmmmmmmmmmmm ;)

Quote: Face

Like AZD, I'm not for any of this tax break nonsense, or fake ecomentalism that comes along with it, but the concept has real potential.

Fake ecomentalism? Leaving aside the debate over whether global warming is real or imagined, surely we can agree that there are a handful of cities on this planet (Beijing, Mexico City, Delhi) where the local air pollution is intolerable.

Perhaps the local air quality is fine in 90% of the United States. But even in the U.S. there are still a few spots that could benefit enormously from electric cars. America's poster child for crappy air is Los Angeles. LA's air quality sucks, and it's not because of factories & industry. (How often do you buy a product manufactured in L.A.?) Almost all of LA's smog is from vehicle exhaust. There are more than 5.8 million automobiles registered in Los Angeles County. Only five states have more registered cars than does Los Angeles County: California (14.2 - not including L.A. County), Texas (8.8 million), New York (8.7 million), Florida (7.2 million), Ohio (6.4 million)

The knock against electric cars is that the electricity comes from burning coal, which is even worse for the air than burning gasoline. True for those of you in West Virginia. But that's not true everywhere. Out of 296,569 gigawatt hours consumed in California in 2013, only 12,842 gigawatts was produced from coal (and most of that was electricity imported from coal incinerators in Arizona & Utah.) In fact, California gets more of its electricity from solar and wind (16,848 gigawatts in 2013) than from coal. Hydro alone (24,098) provides almost twice as much electricity to California as coal.

If all 5.8 million vehicles in Los Angeles were electric, the place would look completely different:

Quote: reno

Quote: Face

Like AZD, I'm not for any of this tax break nonsense, or fake ecomentalism that comes along with it, but the concept has real potential.

Fake ecomentalism? Leaving aside the debate over whether global warming is real or imagined, surely we can agree that there are a handful of cities on this planet (Beijing, Mexico City, Delhi) where the local air pollution is intolerable.

We can agree indeed. LA, where traffic is insane and much of your time is spent idling? Yeah, if electric has the range, it could benefit. London, where streets are still horse-and-buggy width, where commutes are short distance, where parking spots are 4' x 4', absolutely. Beijing, where I don't even know the skyline because I've never seen it on account of the smog? You betcha. Don't pigeonhole me just yet, I do see some of the advantages. I see where even now, they could be the "best" choice.

And on the subject of global warming, I tend to lean toward "yes". While I won't / can't speak toward scale, I find it impossible to believe we have no effect, and further believe that "playing it safe" is always the wise decision. I also believe that said push toward renewable energy and energy independence can only benefit us, that the new tech discovered in the pursuit of this can be great indeed. Really, my only beef against it is when said beliefs are used against us, for lack of a better term. Want an electric car? I'm all for it. Use taxes, i.e. my money, to support it or punish me because it doesn't fit my lifestyle? No sir, I won't tolerate that. Please do push for electric, just let it succeed or fail on its own merit.

When I speak of "fake ecomentalism", it's mostly a rail again group-think, that weird cause-du-jour that seems to wrap people up from time to time. You know, ignorance. Militant hippie-ism, Whole Food warriors, you know the type. The type that buy a 2015 Prius and think they actual did something, the type that dump buckets of paint all over the Hummer lot, that bite their thumb at pick up truck drivers. Being such an outdoorsman and so nature oriented, I very much appreciate one who thinks about such things and tries to make a difference. But these types are just idiotic. They're doing it wrong.

A real environmentalist makes an actual difference. Carpooling dropped my carbon footprint from whatever a 5L V8 puts out over 60 miles to 0. Riding my bike for a small trip into town did the same. Keeping my tires inflated, my engine diagnostics in working order, my bed empty of nonsense, and my foot light on the pedal reduces it when I have to use it. And should I go full hippie to where a truck is intolerable, I would get an old Honda or VW diesel. Their carbon cost has already been sunk. Their carbon use can be / is even lower than a Prius. If I turned my race car back into a street car, swapped in the stock motor, and switched the tranny, 50mpg plus is total possibility. I could probably even run a '71 Roadrunner and be better of than a Prius, purely because the Roadrunner has already been built, whereas a new Prius makes an ungodly amount of pollution to even create.

That is fake ecomentalism.